1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to the field of the online job search market, and more particularly to a system and method for employers to post employment opportunities, for job seekers to post resumes, wherein the employment opportunities and/or resumes are ranked depending on the amount of viewing by an individual.
2. Description of the Related Art
The competitive nature of the online employment services market is a clear indicator that the market is ready for a new approach. The transition of employment services from agencies and recruiters to the Internet is a natural result of a “self-serve” market economy, and this is evident from the rapid growth of the major online job sites. Also, many signs point toward growth in the economy which stimulates a company's hiring activity along with employees seeking better employment. Coupled together, it is a reasonable conclusion that online job sites will play an expanding role in the job seeker's and employer's needs for connecting.
However, currently the ratio of resumes to online job postings is greater than 50:1, with numerous sites proclaiming of the millions of resumes stored on their sites. Furthermore, resumes are difficult to decode and many hiring agents usually funnel data into a standardized application, leaving many applicants unable to distinguish themselves from others. In addition, the rise of software filtering programs removes any personal style left in an applicant's resume.
On the flip side, from the job seeker's perspective, applying for jobs online can be a daunting task, with the expectation that nothing will come of it. The impersonal nature of automatic email responses along with non-existent communication from job postings can provide a false sense of hope; even though it is likely the hiring agent never saw the job seeker's resume.
Furthermore, the online job search market is enormous, with millions of people each year posting resumes and job opportunities online at such popular sites as Monster.com, Careerbuilder.com, Linkedin.com and Craigslist.org. However, most of these solutions consist of simple searching tools, wherein they are simply searching an individuals resume for keywords that match an employer's search, or alternatively, searching an employers job opportunity that match a job seeker's search. Therefore, even though an individual may locate a perspective employee or employment opportunity, there is much human interaction that is still needed to filter the results of the above-referenced search to determine whether an adequate fit exists.
The amount of time necessary for an individual to spend on this second layer of filtering can be daunting. Further complicating this process is the fact that it is very difficult sometimes to find the right candidate for a job opening. Some candidates that an employer locates may already have a job, or are no longer interested in the posted employment opportunity, even though a candidate's resume stays on the job site. These are very common concerns of any employer looking for potential employees and can be described as “SEARCHING PROBLEMS”.
In addition to the frustration employers may encounter in finding the right candidate, job seekers often find these job sites just as tedious and difficult to navigate. Often time's job seekers find it is difficult to describe them simply with a resume. In addition, searching for a job opportunity based on only using keywords tends to be a fruitless endeavor since it is difficult to locate an ideal job opportunity based on a single keyword search. Currently, there is no system that will present job matches that are likely correct for a job seeker based on past searches and an individual's interest and this can be described as “SEEKING PROBLEMS”.
Finally, the current solutions are extremely expensive for employers when they wish to find candidates. On average, most sites charge over $1000.00 a month for search access, and approximately $400.00 to simply post a job opening. As a result, most employers will find this too expensive after a cost-benefit analysis reveals there are not enough quality candidates identified from an employers search as a result of the “SEARCHING PROBLEMS” described above. Therefore, employers could be spending thousands of dollars in search fees for candidates that don't interest them at all and this can be described as “PRICING PROBLEMS”.
The following patents are examples of current solutions in matching employers with job seekers, yet still are not able to effectively and efficiently match the best candidate with the best job opening.
U.S. Pat. App. No. 2001/0034630 to Mayer et al. discloses a method and system for matching candidates to available job positions implemented in a network environment such as the Internet. Candidates can search for available job openings and store their personal profiles in a database maintained by the web server. Employers may conduct searches of the candidate profile database to find one or more candidates who match particular job criteria.
U.S. Pat. App. No. 2004/0128282 to Klienberger et al. discloses a method for computer searching, that includes receiving an initial data set from a data set source then (1), prioritize searches based on the user's preferences, (2), deselecting data items with low priority (3) and displaying results (4). In this invention the user's preferences are determined by information acquired by previous interactions with the search engine and demographic information.
U.S. Pat. App. No. 2001/049674 to Talib et al. discloses a method and systems for efficient employment recruiting. This invention relates to searching a data collection of employment information in a way that makes it easy to search using multiple independent hierarchical category taxonomies of the data collection.
U.S. Pat. App. No. 2004/0172417 to Hartman et al. discloses a resume storage and retrieval system over the Internet where summaries of resumes are broken down into searchable fields. Potential employers are then able to search for employment candidates via these summaries of searchable fields over the World Wide Web or other connectivity services.
U.S. Pat. App. No. 2006/0178896 to Sproul discloses a new way of connecting job seekers with employers that will change the way traditional employment searches are conducted by both parties. The aim is to subordinate the importance of a resume behind or below a more objective matching of a person's personality traits with the desired traits for an available position. This match, along with a set of basic qualification criteria, will be the foundation of the invention's ability to improve both the standard of employment searching and the standard of the final results.
U.S. Pat. App. No. 2006/0265268 to Hyder et al. discloses a job searching and matching system and method is disclosed that gathers job seeker information in the form of job seeker parameters from one or more job seekers, gathers job information in the form of job parameters from prospective employers and/or recruiters, correlates the information with past job seeker behavior, parameters and behavior from other job seekers, and job parameters and, in response to a job seeker's query, provides matching job results based on common parameters between the job seeker and jobs along with suggested alternative jobs based on the co-relationships and based on ratings and preferences provided by the job seeker and provides negative filtration of undesirable jobs based on job seeker input and in response to queries from the system in order to efficiently and accurately accommodate job seeker perception.
In addition Careerbuilder.com has currently launched a new service focusing on job matching technology that is three-fold in nature: (1) Scanning an individual's resume for specific keywords identified by a potential employer or job posting; (2) Remembering what a job seeker or employer has previously searched; (3) Collecting details from previous jobs that an individual has applied to. The logic behind this system is that job candidates will receive jobs that more match their interest, and from using the website more frequently the better the job matches become. However, even though the above-referenced model is the most innovative online job searching tool thus far, it still does not fully address the problem for job seekers and does not address the problem at all for employers, namely how to find the best candidates or the best jobs. On top of this, none of the current solutions take into account the activity or popularity of a job or candidate as a function of how often the particular job or candidate is viewed. The best indicator of fit for both job seeker and employer is not based on keywords, but based on how popular the particular job or candidate is from the interest of other candidates, not an individuals own actions.